Speaking in a Monotone

Speaking in a monotone

Preview

Darwin

The elephant and the butterfly

The zebra and the lark

The cuttlefish and the humming bird

The albatross and the shark

The ant and the orangutan

The razorbill and the whale

The hyena and the skunk

The piranha and… the mole

All creatures in their diversity

All life forms great and small

Are the children of evolution

Charles Darwin made them all

The rattlesnake and the tarantula

The penguin and the dove

The dragonfly and the weevil

The tortoise and… the crane?

The wren, the hen…

The cat, the rat, the stoat, the hog

The sow and – the cow…

The dog, the bat, the toad, the frog

All living things in their complexity

All creatures great and small

Are explained by natural selection

Charles Darwin made them all

The porcupine, the lemur

The anaconda and the bear

The antelope and the bison

The python and the hare

The possum and the cockatiel

The mantis and the conger eel

The parrot, the ferret, the weasel, the goat

The catfish, the dogfish, the stingray, the roach

The blackfly, the greenfly, the dragonfly, the wasp

The adder, the mamba, the corn snake, the asp

All creatures of land and ocean

All inhabitants of air and earth

Are the fittest of survivors

Evolution gave them birth

The flamingo, the swan…

The rhinoceros and the lynx

The grizzly, the elk...

The manatee and… the crab?

The worm, the germ, the monkey, the racoon

The slug, the bug, the donkey, the baboon

The hake, the crake, the snail and the bee

The coot, the newt, the quail and the flea

All creatures in their complexity

All life forms great and small

Are explained by evolutionary theory

Charles Darwin made them all

Gaia

How many of us will survive

The eco-apocalypse?

I am not sure

Perhaps a billion

Perhaps two million

Perhaps fewer

Perhaps more

Perhaps all life on earth will die

When nature’s self-perpetuating

Gaian homeostasis fails

Have we brought this on ourselves?

Are we the inadvertent slayers

of our species?

Of all species, perhaps?

Are we, through inaction,

Our children’s executioners?

Shall we be remembered

As the eliminators of hope?

Are we, through soft complacency,

The eradicators of humanity’s

potential and promise?

– the exterminators

of possibility itself?

Are we laying the foundations

For a planet as desolate as Mars?

Before us

You might have said

That life created

Or at least preserved

A world well suited to itself

After us

You might say

That life was

And is no more

Pointless

in herself she saw it

overpowering, ineradicably foul

reaching outward to engulf her –

an alternative perception

of herself

am I, she whispered,

so utterly disgusting?

am I

so precisely what I am?

am I, she whispered,

so utterly foul?

am I

nothing more than this?

and in reply it whispered

yes

oh yes you are

yes

oh yes you are

and in reply it whispered, yes

oh yes you are

she reached out to restrain –

to restrain who knows what –

vomit or recrimination

or bloody self-abuse

through grinding teeth she whispered

we are

are we not?

are we not

just what we are?

through grinding teeth she whispered

we are

or are we not?

we are

just what we are

through rictus grin it answered her

a sly and sinuous sound

through rictus grin it whispered

we are

oh yes

we are

oh yes

we are

the blunt and empty caricature

of what she should have been

this moment of cognition

inept and weakly wicked

mocked her from a corner

of her callow bedroom wall

yes, it whispered to her

unknotting the tongue it had twisted

yes, it whispered to her

untwisting its knotted tongue

I am, it whispered to her

I…

I know just what I am

oh yes, it whispered to her

I know truly what I am

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